farmers'' Bots and Girls. 
411 
years from infancy to maturity. It is not enough that food, cloth¬ 
ing and shelter are provided for the little ones; they also need a lov¬ 
ing sympathy with their wants, a kind attention to their forming 
tastes, and the stern hand of justice to lead the growing mind up 
to a useful manhood. But too many parents, when they have pro¬ 
vided all things for the physical wants, turn to the arduous labors 
of the field and the farm house, thinking the children will be all 
right; they are too small to be sent to school, too small to be of 
any use on the farm, but when they are a little older they will 
come along into the work and be some help; thus the years slip 
away, and the boys and girls have formed tastes and habits which 
neither precept nor example will be likely to change. “ The twig 
is bent, the tree is inclined,” and the parents find, when too late, 
that their children are not what they wish them to be. 
It was said of one farmer, that as soon as his little babe could 
run about the fields, his father, in a playful way, would ask his ad¬ 
vice about the farm work; in spring he would say: “Well, Ned¬ 
die, what do you think about sowing wheat to-morrow? Shall we 
plant the garden next week and then get in the corn?” And later 
in the season he would ask Neddie if it was not about time to com¬ 
mence haying, and so on all through the year. In this way the boy 
became interested, he soon wished not only to talk about the work, 
but to help do it, and now that boy, at sixteen, can neither be 
' coaxed nor driven from the farm, and it has been observed that he 
accomplishes more work than many farmers in middle life. An¬ 
other very successful farmer, so far as his crops were concerned, 
but thinking more of the hard work than of its benefits, was often 
heard to say: “Ido not wish my boys to become farmers, they 
must have some easier way to get a living;” and acting accord- 
ingly, his boys were early sent to the town, and to-day one is a 
banker in an eastern city, the other a merchant. 
Whatever truth there may be in the oft repeated assertion, that 
our young men are deserting the farm, that the girls hate farming, 
is due mainly to some mistake in the early education; not that all 
the children of farmers can be drilled like so many soldiers, to fall 
into the ranks, and make farming their business; this is in no way 
desirable; the point to be gained with these chihlren of the larin 
is, so to conduct their home life that they will not become disgusted 
with the labors, the responsibilities, the isolation from society, or 
